


Forever Now

by Alyeska_Writes



Series: Brother, Sister [1]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Azula (Avatar) Redemption, Flashbacks, Guilt, Healing, Mental Instability, Ozai (Avatar) is an Asshole, Sibling Bonding, azula is Not Okay, background Zukka if you squint, because she deserves it, can you blame her though?, sibling redemptioin, slowly but surely, why is that not a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:33:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25415479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alyeska_Writes/pseuds/Alyeska_Writes
Summary: The thing is, Zuko should hate her. He should hate Azula, and he should hate their father, for everything he endured in childhood after the disappearance of his mother.
Series: Brother, Sister [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1847293
Comments: 17
Kudos: 221





	Forever Now

**Author's Note:**

> i needed this, okay? i just needed this. it all started bc decided that azula didn't always call zuko 'zuzu' out of condescension, and that she used it when she was teeny tiny. because yes. we deserved to see soft flashbacks from when they were little. and AZULA DESERVES REDEMPTION OK SHE DESERVES IT SO MUCH. anyway.
> 
> title is taken from Michael Bublé's song "Forever Now" and i know it's about his kid but shh.

The thing is, Zuko should hate her. He should hate Azula, and he should hate their father, for everything he endured in childhood after the disappearance of his mother, for everything they did to the rest of the _world_. From what Zuko has heard, Ozai is just as horrible as his grandfather. Worse, perhaps. Sozin used to comet to wipe out the air nomads, and yeah, that was pretty fucking evil, but Zuko still has trouble believing that he’s _related_ to a person who was going to use the comet to wipe out _everyone_. Phoenix King, honestly.

But it’s not his father that’s on Zuko’s mind. Yeah, Zuko pities him, and getting thoroughly bitchslapped by a twelve year-old who takes your bending away must be pretty humiliating, but whatever, he got what was coming to him. He was old enough to know better and not nearly old enough to be as obstinate as he was. Obsessed with honor to the point where he had to burn his thirteen year-old son. 

Regardless.

While Ozai is far from Zuko’s mind on a daily basis, as opposed to how he thinks about his mother in almost every waking moment, there is one family member that invades his thoughts every chance she gets and causes a real, physical pain in his heart that seems like it’s never going away.

His sister.

He should hate her. He should want her to rot. She was cruel, she was… _unhinged,_ and she would have killed him and never lost a minute of sleep over it. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t hate her. She’s his _sister_. She drove him insane and she lied and she manipulated, but in her own, strange, Azula way, she cared about him. When he was trying to re-acclimate to life back home in the Fire Nation the first time, she had her background, manipulative motives, yes, but there were moments where she was genuinely looking out for him. 

And then he left, and she hunted him, tried to kill him and his friends—well. The alliance with the Gaang was shaky at best for a long, _long_ time, but his point still stands. And…spirits only know what happened between then and the day of the comet, but something happened. He knew that Ty Lee and Mai betrayed her to protect each other, and he knew that must’ve hurt, but everything else…Zuko can only speculate, but something inside of his sister…broke, and it showed.

And he’s heartbroken.

Because there was a time, before their father took Azula and twisted her into the person she became, where they were…normal siblings. They played together, they squabbled over toys and there were times when Azula, tiny and innocent and terrified of the storm raging outside or the monsters she was convinced were hiding under the bed, would run into his room and crawl into his bed and huddle under the covers and plead for him to sing the song that Uncle taught them.

And when he saw her, broken and defeated, in the haze of indescribable pain and _‘oh spirits, I’m going to die’_ , he saw the little girl who trusted her big brother to protect her from the monsters under her bed.

She’s being cared for. She’s being cared for by the best there is, but a mixture of herbs and medicines are prescribed to her keep her sleepy and practically unintelligible, as to not be a danger to anyone, and Zuko has avoided visiting her, because seeing her so…subdued, so muted and restrained would be…Zuko doesn’t have the words for it. Is Azula without her quick wit and sharp edges even Azula at all? Would he recognize her?

Sometimes he lay awake at night, and wonders if things could have been different. If Mother took them with her, would they have been different? Would they have had a relationship like, say, Katara and Sokka? Teasing each other all day long and squabbling like siblings do, but understanding that they love each other all the same, and willing to lay down their lives for each other. If their father had never interfered, if he hadn’t poisoned an innocent child’s mind and molded her to be just like him, would they have actually gotten along?

…would she have joined him to help the Avatar?

Speculation and what-ifs, however, are useless, and Zuko knows that, but knowledge and acceptance are two different things, and sometimes knowledge hurts just as much. Sometimes it hurts even more.

Because it’s not fair, is it? It’s _not fair!_ Zuko was only two when Azula was born, but he remembers bits and pieces. He remembers her being tiny and fragile, gripping his finger so tight in her little fist and smiling a gummy smile at him, however distant and hazy the memory is. He remembers, through a thick fog, curiously watching her sleep as Mother sang to them both, and vaguely thinking that there was no way he was ever that small, although Mother told him he was.

When they were both tiny, fragile, and harmless.

Zuko should hate Azula. Thinking about her fate shouldn’t break his heart so completely, shouldn’t make him want to cry and scream to the heavens, and beg to have his sister back, beg for her to be whole, to know forgiveness and know that she is loved.

But he doesn’t hate her. And he wants his sister back. He wants Azula to be whole, he wants her to know forgiveness, and know that she is loved. Because she _is._ Maybe not by most, definitely not by Katara, whose vehemence is fueled by her passion, but Ty Lee and Mai loved her, and they never stopped. 

Zuko loves her. At the end of the day, he still loves her. And maybe that’s what hurts the most.

And what the hell is he supposed to do with that? So far, it’s been a strange mixture of fear, regret, anger and guilt that’s kept him from seeing her, and he knows that seeing her would be incredibly painful, but not seeing her is incredibly painful, and honestly, he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Either way, nothing will ever be the same. In some ways, that’s good. There are things Zuko would never want to go back to. But in some ways, that’s so…he doesn’t have the words for it. He just knows that in some ways, he hates it.

So he does what he’s (almost) always done. He asks his uncle. There was a time where he agreed that Azula was out of control and needed to be stopped, but that was in wartime, when it was either her or them. Uncle has a lot of love to give, more than anyone Zuko knows (except maybe Aang), and he loves his niece, just like he loves his nephew. Besides, if anyone can understand having a difficult (to put it lightly) relationship with a younger sibling, it’s definitely Uncle Iroh.

He wonders…did Iroh feel the same way about his brother’s descent into pure _madness?_ Someone he watched grow up, someone who he knew to be innocent, until one day he woke up, and the child he knew and loved and protected was gone, a monster in his place. The very monster that he feared was underneath his bed at night, so very long ago. Iroh had expressed how saddened he was by what happened in Ba Sing Se, but only because he thought Zuko had lost his way. Was it the same when he was betrayed by his brother?

Iroh is silent for several moments, when Zuko asks him as much. Zuko likes to think that he knows his uncle pretty well, but his expression is unreadable, for a long time. And when he sighs, he looks…tired.

“The age gap between my brother and I is…cavernous.” he says, finally. “I can clearly remember the day he was born. He was so…small, and innocent. Do you remember the song I taught you and your sister?”

“Of course.”

“Before I sang it to Lu Ten, I would sing it to your father. When he was scared, or sad, or merely…wanted to hear it,” Uncle murmurs. Zuko can recall times when his uncle’s sadness, a deep and unyielding thing, would be there, clear upon his face and making him seem much older than he is, when he thought nobody was looking. This is like one of those times, only it’s almost like he forgot Zuko was there, lost in a sea of his own memory. “And I remember him as a rambunctious child, as a _boy_. I don’t know what happened to him, or how he became the man he is, but I find myself having so many regrets. But then…I was much the same for a long time. We were all conditioned to believe that our Nation was the greatest on Earth, but when it came right down to it…both you and I had to learn the hard way that we weren’t sharing our greatness. We were conquering, and condemning, and forcing everyone else into silence.”

Iroh sighs again, a deep, exhausted sigh, and continues,

“It may be too late for my brother. But remember that Azula is only fourteen. She has a lot to unlearn, that is true. But she _is_ still your sister, and I see in you the same regrets I had. I don’t want you to still have them when you’re older.”

However, despite his uncle’s advice (sound as always), Zuko finds himself procrastinating. So many things could go wrong, but then…all his fears are selfish ones. So maybe the fact that he wants to see Azula is, in fact, selfish in nature, because he misses her, but he has a feeling she has no desire to see him. But…

_Azula is only fourteen._

She’s only fourteen years old. Agni, she’s still a _child._ Zuko is struck once again by the unfairness of it all. She’s so young, too young, for all of this… _nonsense._ Sure, the war is over, but all of the ideals that were instilled in her mind, and in Zuko’s mind for that matter, are still fresh. She, if any of them, deserves to know the truth. Azula still has so much to learn, so much to experience, and Zuko would be damned if she didn’t at least have the _chance._

And so, that’s how he finds himself travelling to the asylum (and spirits, that word leaves a sour taste in his mouth) on a dreary day, heart pounding inside his chest.

* * *

_There really was a time when they played together like ordinary siblings. When they’d chase each other about the gardens until one or both of them collapsed in exhaustion. Mischief was a given—Azula had that particular sparkle in her eye since the day she was born, and although Zuko tended to shy away from confrontation, there was more than one time where his sister could talk him into stupid stuff, for the fun of it._

_One day, they were caught in the midst of it. Azula’s idea, of course, and both of them were no strangers to scoldings, but as Ozai prepared to lay into them, and Zuko had looked into Azula’s eyes, had seen her lip wobbling, and had seen a fear of their father that he would later learn was anything but healthy, the same fear that Zuko had known, he found himself pleading,_

_“It was my idea, not Azula’s! It wasn’t her fault! Don’t punish her, punish me instead!”_

_Ozai hadn’t said anything for several moments, and the only sounds that could be heard were Azula’s tiny whimpers that she desperately tried to hold in. Eventually, however, she was dismissed._

_Hours later, after Zuko had stopped crying and thoroughly berated himself for crying at all, he wandered out to the garden to feed the turtleducks, something that had always calmed him. He watched them swim about the pond without a care in the world. They didn’t have to worry about upsetting their father, because, well, their father wasn’t even there, was he? Sometimes, Zuko wondered how different it would be if it was just him, Mother, and Azula. Like the turtleducks, just the children and their mom. Maybe they’d be happier._

_“I don’t need you to protect me,” Azula’s voice came from right behind him, and she giggled when he nearly jumped out of his skin. “I can protect myself. Dummy.”_

_Zuko sighed, and rolled his eyes. As if it should’ve been obvious, he told her,_

_“I’m your big brother. I’m supposed to protect you.”_

_“…What if you can’t, though?”_

_“Shut up. I’ll always protect you, Azula.”_

That was, what, seven or eight years ago? Maybe a little less? And here they are, now. Azula in an asylum after dissociating from reality, their father in prison, their mother’s whereabouts unknown. All Zuko knows, as he nears his sister’s room, is that he failed her. He failed to protect her from the poison their father poured in her ear, failed to protect her from even herself.

He only hopes he can set things right now.

“The Fire Lord comes to visit little old me…” is the flippant greeting Zuko receives upon entering Azula’s room. She looks…well, she doesn’t look good. “To what do I owe the _pleasure,_ Your Highness?”

“They tell me that you’re heavily sedated,” Zuko replies. “But you still manage to be so derisive. That’s impressive.”

He didn’t come here to fight with her. Grimacing, he takes a seat, as close as either of them will allow, which…is almost halfway across the room.

“No, I’m sorry,” he sighs, and pinches the bridge of his nose. “I didn’t come here to argue.”

“Then why _are_ you here?” she demands, a sudden vehemence in her tone that somehow lacks conviction. “Have you come to gloat?’

The ugly part of Zuko thinks it would serve her right. From the time Azula proved herself to be prodigious and on, all she’s done is gloat. But he has no desire to shove her failures in her face. He knows first hand how awful that feels, and if he’s honest, he wouldn’t wish it upon anyone.

“No. I wanted to see how you’re doing.”

And that’s the truth.

“Oh, that’s right, I forgot,” Azula hisses. “You’re buddy-buddy with the Avatar and all his little friends. So righteous and _pure,_ aren’t you, Zuzu?”

He doesn’t dignify that with an answer.

“Why else would you want to visit me, want to _see how I’m doing?_ Don’t act like you care.”

“Don’t assume that I don’t care,” Zuko whispers. He knows Azula hears it.

“ _Don’t_ _lie to me!_ ” 

“I’m not lying, Azula.”

“You’re just like Mother!” Azula spits, and no, Zuko was not expecting that. “You think I’m a monster!” Once again, the reminder that Azula is only _fourteen years old_ slams full-force into the young Fire Lord, as the girl struggles to push herself up out of her seat, to do…spirits know what. It’s no longer a sense of pity that Zuko feels, but a deep, endless sadness. To see someone who was always so powerful, deadly and swift, reduced to this; weakened by medication and succumbed to madness…it’s a strange mix of guilty relief and confusing disappointment.

A nurse has responded to Azula’s distress, and Zuko never noticed her entrance.

“I think you should leave.” she advises.

“But…”

“Trust me, Highness, you won’t want to see this.”

“What are you…?” Zuko never finishes his question, unsure if he even wants the answer to it. The nurse looks…grim.

“To be blunt? She’ll have to be restrained.”

Oh. Yeah, maybe it’s best he leaves. Azula’s rambling is rising in both pitch and volume, and she’s starting to sound like she did after her defeat. Desperate and afraid, and Zuko hates it. Hates that he feels like he caused it, and hates that she has to feel this way at all.

He leaves without argument.

* * *

It’s often the same when he visits her. She hurls desperate insults at him, she devolves until she’s screaming at him, and he leaves before it can escalate too far. One time, he glances over his shoulder and vows never to do so again. Seeing her sedated but unrestrained was painful enough, but nothing prepared him to witness it when she _was_ restrained. She looked so helpless, so small, and Zuko was blinking back tears for the rest of the day.

This time, however, as he’s leaving, something is different. As per the last few weeks, Azula seemed to want nothing to do with him, but it’s as Zuko makes his way down the corridor, toward the exit, that he hears a desperate plea,

“Zuko! Zuko, help me! _Zuko, please!_ ”

She sounds so helpless, so afraid, so alone.

Zuko stops, and fights the urge to turn back for several moments. It’s only when he’s returned home and locked himself in his chambers, that he sinks to the floor and weeps.

* * *

Zuko has a strange dream that night.

In it, he’s feeding the turtleducks, but that’s not so strange. What’s strange, is that he can clearly see his reflection in the water, and his scar is gone. His face unmarred, his sight and hearing are perfect. In the dream, he knows he’s waiting for someone, but who he’s waiting for is uncertain. All he knows is that they’re late, and he’s beginning to grow impatient, but it’s almost…a fond feeling.

Almost as if on cue, soft footsteps approach, and he sees his reflection smiling, hears himself say,

“You’re late.”

“I’m not late,” Azula responds. “You’re early.”

“My timing is impeccable.”

“Ha! You wish!”

Zuko stands and turns to her sister. Her smile is soft, and affectionate.

“Come on, already,” he sighs, teasingly impatient. “They’re waiting for us.”

“I know, I know…” her smile turns mischievous, then, the same glint in her eyes from childhood. “Race you there!”

And she takes off running, without him.

“Hey!”

It’s just like when they were children, chasing each other around the palace grounds and through corridors, until they burst into a room. Mother and Uncle wait for them, and while Uncle laughs boisterously, Mother attempts to look unimpressed, but it’s clear that she’s holding back a smile.

“You’re late,” she tells them.

“Azula was late,” Zuko corrects.

“And I said you all were early,” Azula sighs, shaking her head. It’s a playful thing.

“She might be right,” says Uncle. “Time is an illusion.”

“Oh, please.” Mother laughs. “Come, sit down and have some tea with us.”

The dream shifts, then, and Zuko is walking along the beach on Ember Island, their summer home barely visible in the distance. Lu Ten walks beside him, and he looks just like he did the last time Zuko saw him. A lot like how Uncle must have looked at that age.

“She’ll be okay,” says Lu Ten. “You know that, right?”

“But she’s so fragile right now…” Zuko argues. “How do you know she’ll be okay?”

“Because she has you,” his cousin laughs, and winks. “You did say you’d always protect her. You may have failed her once, but that doesn’t mean all is lost.”

“Agni, you sound just like your father sometimes.”

Lu Ten’s laughter is boisterous, just like Uncle’s.

“Consider it a family trait.”

And then Zuko is alone again, with only the sound of the waves upon the sand. However, something feels—urgent. Like he has somewhere to be, _right now_ and he has someone he needs to see _right now,_ so he takes off, sprinting down the beach, moving fast enough that his feet barely sink into the sand. He runs faster, and faster, and _faster,_ and then—he stops.

Azula stands before him, but not Azula as he knows her now. Azula from eight years ago, six years old and small, and afraid, and _lost,_ and Zuko falls to his knees before her, pulls her into his arms and refuses to let go. Little hands grip the fabric of his tunic, and a little voice whispers,

“You promise you’ll be here?”

“I promise. I’ll always protect you, Azula.”

Zuko awakens in a cold sweat, alone.

* * *

“I thought your sister was like, big time crazy,” Sokka grouses. He’s not the only one who’s been less than pleased about Zuko’s frequent visits to the asylum. Katara has also expressed just how much of a stupid idea it is. “Like, sadistic, will do anything to get what she wants, kinda crazy.”

Zuko takes his time answering. Part of him wants to agree; yeah, Azula is wolf-batshit crazy. Completely out of her mind and out of touch with reality. Part of him wants to vehemently defend her, but to say that she’s fine would be a total lie. Because in reality, Azula, like everyone, has her good days and her bad days. Her bad days merely happen to be worse than most. But on her good days? She’s almost normal. The last time Zuko was there, she even let him sit directly across from her.

“I think she’s lost,” he answers, eventually. “Lost, and confused, and scared. Wouldn’t you be?”

Sokka regards him strangely, for a moment, the same look on his face when he’s trying to puzzle out some confounded political issue or one of his inventions.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…she and I were both raised in a world of propaganda, and both of us were raised to believe that we belonged to the greatest nation on Earth,” Zuko explains. “Generals who conquered and colonized cities were regarded as war heroes, and genocide was fucking— _glorified,_ you know? It’s…different, when something happens to you, and it begins to chip away at that…ridiculously elaborate facade.”

Zuko doesn’t talk much about what happened to him, when he was thirteen. He’s told Sokka, and he’s mentioned a brief explanation to Aang, but aside from that…most people only know what they’d heard when he’d been exiled. Sokka, predictably, goes quiet then.

“It was different for Azula. She was…a prodigy. She was Father’s favorite, but what she didn’t know was that Father didn’t love her at all. I don’t think he’s capable of love, when you get right down to it. But as long as she kept meeting his expectations, he would show his approval, his acceptance, his affection. All of that was withheld if we messed up in any way. So she became what she became. And now? Now she has nothing. And I know how terrifying that must be for her.”

Zuko stops. He thinks for a moment. He asks,

“How old is Katara?”

“She’ll be fifteen next month...why?”

“Azula just turned fifteen a little while ago,” Zuko tells him. “Think about that for a minute, and tell me you don’t think for a second that Katara is too damn young to go through what my sister is going through, right now. Tell me that you wouldn’t give everything you have to protect her.”

Sokka hesitates, looks like he wants to argue, and thinks better of it.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“I know Azula can hold her own, Agni knows that I understand that better than anyone. But if you could see her…” Zuko sighs, runs a hand through his hair. “But there are small things, y’know? Like, for example, she let me spend her birthday with her. She lets me sit closer to her than before. Stuff like that? That’s _precious_ to me. We don’t have what you and Katara have, I don’t know if we ever really did, or if we ever will. So these small, seemingly unimportant moments in time, are so important to me.”

Again, Sokka is silent, his expression unreadable, but his eyes, sharp as ever, read Zuko like an open book. Finally, quietly, he says,

“I understand.”

* * *

_He remembers the day she learned to firebend._

_She was a prodigy right from the start. She was still so young when she created her first flame. Still, the first person she ran to, was her brother._

_“Zuko! Look what I can do!”_

_And he was so proud of her at that moment. There was no jealousy, their father had yet to push that onto them, and Ziko’s smile had been bright, almost painfully wide._

_“Want me to teach you a cool trick I learned?”_

_“Yeah! Show me!”_

_“Alright. Watch closely.”_

* * *

On one of her better days, Azula actually smiles at him. Not her usual self-righteous smirk, but a genuine smile, the same mischievous gleam in her eyes from when they were children. That day, she even lets him hug her goodbye.

The next time he comes back, the nurse tells them that they’re free to take a stroll in the gardens if they want, that it’d be nice for Azula to get some fresh air. So they take the opportunity while they still have it, and yeah, Zuko does think that being outside does Azula some good. She looks so pale, and tired normally. But outside in the sunlight, color begins to return to her face and she looks energized, younger. Well, maybe not younger than she is, but she finally looks her age.

It hits him then that he wasn’t the only one who grew up too fast. He’d been given the reminder by his uncle that Azula was still so young, and it was more of a revelation than it should have been. But now, remembering what Azula had done to keep their father’s approval, remembering the responsibilities and expectations they had living under their father’s thumb, it saddens him to think that neither of them got to be normal teenagers.

Of course, nobody that he knows got to be normal teeenagers, ever. Sokka, Katara, Toph—all of them had to change life as they knew it, because they _knew_ it was their destiny to help the Avatar. And Aang? Aang _is_ the Avatar. The kid woke up in an iceberg after one hundred years and was told he had to save the world by the end of the summer. None of them got to be kids, except brief moments of peace where they rode giant animals or got to go swimming or held dance parties in caves.

(Sometimes, Zuko just has to laugh at the antics his friends got up to before they were friends with him.)

But the point still stands.

Here, in the gardens, neither Zuko or Azula have to deal with the expectations that still weigh them down. Zuko is not the Fire Lord out here, and Azula is not the ex-princess that went nuts on her coronation day. They’re normal teenagers, for once. Azula points to a turtleduck pond, not unlike the one at the palace, and Zuko follows her there. Feeding the turtleducks was something he always did with Mother, and very rarely with his sister. Her habit of throwing too-large chunks of bread at the babies had been the beginning of the end, if he recalls, but that doesn’t matter. At least, not right now.

Besides, Azula wants to, and who is he to argue?

“So. Now that the war is over, how…have things been?”

Zuko could laugh out loud. Strip away their anger and power, and he and his sister are just as awkward as each other. His stupid ‘ _Hello, Zuko here!’_ Comes to mind.

“Are you actually curious, or are you just trying to make conversation?” he teases.

“I…yes. Both, I suppose.”

Zuko does laugh this time, a small and quiet thing.

“Well…Aang does his best to restore and maintain balance. I mean, that’s his job, after all. But after everything our nation has done in the last hundred years, well…obviously there’s some distrust. Not everyone believes that the end goal is peace.”

“Peace is for fools.”

For some reason, she sounds like she doesn’t quite believe herself.

“…if we’d known peace before, neither of us would be here right now.”

“…yeah.”

Silence passes over them, but Zuko thinks, it’s not as oppressive as it used to be.

“Remember how I used to feed turtleducks?”

“Azula, no.”

“Azula, yes.”

She raises her arm as if she’s actually going to do it, and Zuko hears himself release a long-suffering sigh, feels himself cocking his eyebrow, rather than consciously doing those things. Azula pauses, then, her smile falling into something sad looking. She lowers her arm and picks at the bread in her hands. Just when Zuko is about to ask what’s wrong, she confesses, quietly,

“You looked just like Mom right then.”

Zuko isn’t sure if she meant that as a compliment or not.

* * *

_‘Zuzu’ hadn’t always been something she said just to get on his nerves. It hadn’t always been something condescending. In fact, it used to actually be_ affectionate. _More to the point, it was what she called him when she was still learning how to speak. There was a time when Azula had admired her brother. Two years old, running after him as fast as her little legs would carry, calling to him,_

_“Zuzu! Play!”_

_Little hands, still chubby with baby fat, reaching out for him, high pitched, shrieking giggles as she tried to catch up._

_“Zuko, your sister wants to play with you.” Mother had said, chiding but fond. “Go on.”_

_And there were other times._

_He remembers how the storm had kept him awake. He wasn’t afraid of it, really. He had yet to associate lightning with terror and agony, and he liked the way it briefly lit up his room, liked to count the seconds between the bolt of lightning and the clap of thunder._

_But not everyone was fond of it._

_He perked up at the sound of his door opening, could hear tentative footsteps just at the threshold. It’s only when he looked up, and a flash of lightning briefly illuminated Azula’s face that she cried out and scurried to his side, burying herself under the blanket._

_“What’s the matter, Azula?” he asked, gently. “Did the storm scare you?”_

_She didn’t answer with words, only a nod. Zuko didn’t know what to say to her, really. He couldn’t recall a time where he was actually afraid of storms, but then, everyone is afraid of something, right?_

_“Sing a song, Zuzu.” Azula pleaded._

_“The one Uncle Iroh taught us?”_

_“Mmhm!”_

_At that, at least, she perked up, poked her head out of the blanket and leaned against him._

_“Leaves from the vine, falling so slow.”_

_Azula closed her eyes, and the fear began to melt away._

_“Like fragile tiny shells, drifting in the foam.”_

_A yawn escaped her, and she smiled a tired smile._

_“Little soldier boy, come marching home.”_

_Her voice was small, and she was starting to succumb to the pull of sleep, but she still joined in for the final lines,_

_“Brave soldier boy, comes marching home.”_

* * *

It’s storming today.

Zuko would love to say he doesn’t flinch every time lightning cracks across the sky, but then, he’d be lying. It’s…well, he’s not sure how to feel about his newfound dislike of lightning. Both his father and Azula played their part in that, and he has a new scar to match Aang’s from the last time he tried to redirect an attack. Still, he refuses to miss a visit. He hasn’t missed one yet, has he?

Azula seems to be faring well. Her good days have been frequent lately, her bad days few and far between. The nurses tell Zuko that his visits help, and it’s…surprising, if he’s honest. He’d think it’d be the opposite, but maybe it’s the fact that Azula knows that she has someone in her corner, that someone cares about her, is what’s helping.

She even lets him make tea today.

“It’s definitely not as good as Uncle’s,” Zuko says as he pours them both a cup. “But it’s not…horrible. At least I hope it’s not.”

“I mean you _did_ work in a tea shop,” she chuckles. “That must’ve helped.”

“So I’m not completely hopeless.”

“No, not completely. Myself, on the other hand.”

That’s…concerning. She’s often made jokes at the expense of others, but never herself. Zuko hadn’t noticed he’d been pulling a face until Azula laughs and says,

“What? Don’t look at me like that. I see you flinch every time the lightning strikes. I know that’s my fault. And I’m stuck here for the rest of my life, so what does that tell you?”

Zuko takes his time answering. He takes a sip of his tea, sets his cup down, and folds his arms.

“You see, I take several issues with—everything you just said.”

“Oh? And why would that be, Brother Dear?”

“I don’t believe you’re stuck here for the rest of your life, for one,” he starts, and counts the reasons on his fingers. “Secondly, it’s not your fault that I’m not a fan of lightning.” So, that may have been a blatant lie, but if he blamed Azula for everything she did when she honestly didn’t know any better (or rather when her upbringing had her conditioned a certain way), then the Gaang would still have to blame him for everything he did before he joined them. “I’d sooner blame the tyrant we call Father. And lastly, no sister of mine is going to call herself hopeless, so there.”

Azula’s look of surprise is there and gone within moments, but he knows he caught her off guard.

“My brother, the Fire Lord. So very smart,” it lacks its usual bite. “…do you really think I’m not actually stuck here?”

This time, Zuko’s answer is immediate,

“Why wouldn’t I think that?”

“Because I tried to kill you and all your friends? That usually puts a damper on the relationship between siblings.”

“Usually,” he agrees. “But I also know that we’re both a product of our upbringing. And, Azula, come on, you’re just a kid.”

“You’re only two years older than me.”

“And? What does that tell you?”

“…I guess you’re right.”

She doesn’t seem to be expecting it when Zuko tosses his head back and lets out a hearty laugh. It does, however, startle one similar, if quieter, out of her.

“What…?”

“Nothing, just…I can’t recall the last time you admitted I was right.”

Her confusion melts into a grin, albeit a small one.

“Yeah, well, don’t get used to it. You’re still my annoying older brother.”

“And you’re still my obnoxious little sister.”

Zuko knows, in that moment, that both of them are comforted by that. He knows that neither of them would have it any other way.

He thought, for a moment, that the distraction of having someone to talk to would take his mind off the storm outside, but a particularly nasty bolt of lightning startles him, and he finds himself closing his eyes to regain control of himself, reminding himself that there’s nothing to be afraid of. He’s pretty confident that Azula won’t actively try to harm him, and his father couldn’t even if he wasn’t in prison.

(So, _so_ glad that Aang took his bending away.)

A hand on his shoulder causes him to actually _flinch_ this time, but only because he wasn’t expecting it. When he opens his eyes, Azula looks…almost guilty. And then, she hugs him. To someone on the outside, it’s not much, but to Zuko, it’s everything. A leap for them both. Azula is never the one that initiates contact. Sure, she’ll ask for a hug, but mostly she stands there awkwardly until Zuko hugs her first.

It’s funny, he thinks. Usually he’s the one doing the comforting, he’s the one telling Azula that everything is going to be okay. Usually he’s the one that strokes her hair and distracts her from whatever’s going on in her mind, but not today. And part of Zuko thinks this might be a nice change for her, to be the one to offer solace this time. It’s certainly a nice change for him.

She does something else he doesn’t expect.

She sings to him.

“ _Leaves from the vine…falling so slow._

He can’t help it when he grins. He wonders if she remembers when Uncle taught them the song. He wonders if she remembers when he sang it to her when she was afraid. Or is this just what she thinks is right?

Funny how some things come full circle.

* * *

_“Mom hates me.”_

_They’d been steadily growing apart, by then. Azula’s prowess and intelligence hadn’t gone unnoticed by their father, and he had already begun to drive a wedge between them. Sometimes, Azula would say or do something that Zuko, deeply sensitive from a young age, found confusing or sometimes, frightening._

_But that was not one of those times. He was startled out of his studies by the confession, yes, and then confused, but ultimately, he found the need to convince her otherwise._

_“No she doesn’t!”_

_“Yes she does. She thinks I’m a monster.”_

_Azula had tried to say it nonchalantly, but the words hurt, and it showed. It was true, yes, that Zuko and his mother had a different relationship than Azula had with her. But, again, Zuko was deeply sensitive. Perhaps Mother was more protective of him, and perhaps she saw things in Azula that she wasn’t necessarily fond of, but that doesn’t mean she hated her._

_“You’re not a monster, Azula," Zuko told her._

_“Try telling Mom that.”_

_He didn’t know what to say to that, and they lapsed into silence._

_The wedge was driven in further._

* * *

Zuko had to miss a visit one day. He’d been busy from the moment he woke up, and hadn’t had a chance to so much as breathe until the day was over, and he’d completely forgotten that Azula was waiting for him. By the time he remembered, it was too late to go to the asylum, and it was too late to send a message.

So he has a feeling, upon entering the facility, that today is going to be a bad day. He doesn’t count on being able to stay long. His suspicions are proven correct upon entering Azula’s room and something, he’s not sure what it is (although his suspicions tell him it was a cup) whizzes past his head.

She could firebend, and they both know she could, but instead, Azula elects to throw whatever she can get her hands on, howling like a wounded animal. A pillow bounces off Zuko’s chest before he finally breaks out of his initial shock and realizes that the nurses will be coming soon. Immediately, he envisions her restrained, and knows he has to calm her down before someone else tries.

“Azula!” he calls, and takes a careful step forward. “Azula, relax!”

“No! You’re a _liar,_ Zuko! You lied to me!”

A vase shatters against the wall, and Zuko ducks as Azula hurls a plate at his head.

“How did I lie to you?” he asks, calmly as he can. “Talk to me, Azula.”

“You said you’d be here! You said you’d never leave me! You said you’d get me out of here, and you _lied!_ You’re just like Mom!”

On any other day, being just like Mother would be a compliment.

Before she decides to try and blast him out of the room, Zuko takes an opening and surges forward. He hates to do this, he really, really hates to do this, but he grabs Azula’s wrists and holds on, even as she fights him. He hates this, but if it means not letting Azula harm him or herself…

“You’re just like Mom!” she repeats. “You think I’m a monster!”

“No, I don’t,” Zuko replies. Why does it break his heart so much to hear her say that? “I don’t think you’re a monster.”

“Yes you do! You hate me! _Admit it!_ ”

He has hated her before. He’s hated her in intervals. For hours or days at a time. But it was gone as soon as it was there, and he doesn’t hate her now, and he could never.

“No, I don’t hate you.”

Azula could still bend at any moment. She could kill him right now, if she wanted. But something tells Zuko that she doesn’t want to. Something tells him that, that’s the opposite of what she wants.

“I don’t hate you,” he repeats. “You don’t have to believe me, but I don’t hate you. I love you, Azula. You’re my sister, and I love you.”

The storm they call Azula begins to subside. Her expression is unreadable for several moments, and then…she crumbles. Her face screws up in anguish, and tears immediately form in her eyes. One harsh sob escapes her, and she buries her face in her brother’s chest. From there, the dam breaks, and Zuko can’t remember a time like this. Can’t remember a time where her tears weren’t from pure desperation. He knows this feeling all too well, and he knows that she won’t be calmed any time soon. All he can do is hold her, and offer to be the rock to her that Uncle always was to him.

It occurs to him then that they're not so different, him and his sister. Both of them craved the attention that the other received. Azula had the acceptance and the praise from Father, but Zuko had the attention and the affection from Mother, and that’s really not fair at all, is it? For either of them. They were _children_ for Agni’s sake, and their parents inspired a deep and bitter jealousy in both of them, driving them further apart when they needed each other the most. And now, with neither of their parents there to validate them, to give them the acceptance that they desire, they only have each other.

He promises her that he’ll stay until she falls asleep, and he keeps that promise. It’s late into the night by the time he finally leaves, and no nurses have bothered them. It’s not until Zuko is almost to the door that one of them finally stops him.

“Thank you,” she says.

“What for…?”

“For calming her, today. We’ve been unsuccessful all week. I think she just wanted her brother.”

They’re getting somewhere, at least.

* * *

Azula still has her ups and downs, and the Gaang still have their doubts. But nobody said progress was swift. All one has to do is look at the four nations. There’s still tension, and there’s still mistrust, but they’re all working toward a better tomorrow. One day, the balance will be completely restored. One day, people will be able to look to one another and not wonder if they’ll be able to place their trust in each other or not. One day, perhaps, the four nations won’t be separate, and won’t be joined together by force, but by a common desire for peace and prosperity.

And one day, Azula _will_ be healed. She won’t doubt herself or others. She’ll be able to live a life that’s _normal,_ a life without fear. She’ll love who she wants to love without believing that she’s a disgrace. She’ll know peace.

Zuko took that journey himself. He had to work towards it, work through his anger and his fear and the deep rooted hatred he felt for nobody but himself. It was hard, spirits was it hard, and there were times he thought he wouldn’t make it out alive. Sometimes he saw the light at the end, and sometimes he stumbled through the dark. But he had help. He had his uncle, and later, his friends.

If Azula lets him, he’ll be there for her as long as he’s alive. He’ll be there to guide her through the dark, just as Uncle did for him, and he’ll be there to pick her up when she stumbles and falls. Agni knows it’ll be as difficult for her as it was for him, perhaps even more so. But at the end of the day, all he wants is for her to know that someone cares about her, that she’s loved, and that she’s accepted.

Because she is.

**Author's Note:**

> azula nation let's go.
> 
> anyway i hope you enjoyed. soft siblings are soft. :)


End file.
